Tuuuuuuuuna… Patties…

It’s 1:30am and I just ate dinner. Admittedly I didn’t start making dinner till after midnight thanks to the gorgeous Wild One dropping by for a couple of hours, but still. I’m writing this at 1:45am in an attempt to remember the recipe for later.

I’m trying to eat healthier and in the great debate on what to make that wasn’t loaded with sugar, take out or poison (read: full of FODMap foods) I randomly settled on trying to make a favourite dish from my childhood: Tuna Patties.

The recipe is really simple, but I forgot something very important…

It takes a shit ton of TIME. So if you’re after dinner in under ten minutes this isn’t the recipe for you. However if you’re doing pre-planned meals and want something super fast sitting there for later in the week then this is totally the recipe for you.

They’re really not exciting to look at at all. They taste good though.

Bone’s Tuna Patty Recipe

Edit: I refer to this as my recipe because I was making it up from memory. Obviously it was originally my Mum’s and she probably had like twice the ingredients involved because she’s a mother and they do shit like that and make it look easy.

4x medium to large potatoes

1x 450g can of tuna in brine (drain the brine off please)

Keen’s curry powder (The yellow kind for those of you not in Australia)

2 – 3 large eggs

Gluten Free corn flour

Gluten Free bread crumbs

So we start with the potatoes. Dice these babies up and chuck them in a pot of boiling water to cook till mashable. I, personally, use the washed ones so I don’t have to peel them. I like to pretend it’s because someone told me that vegies hold all the nutrients in the skin (which one day I’ll follow up on) but honestly it’s because I’m too lazy to peel the fuckers.

Once the potatoes are nice and soft throw them in a bowl with the tuna and about 1/3 to 1/2 a teaspoon of the curry powder – look I guesstimate a lot of this stuff as I go. Mash all that stuff up till it’s… not smooth but not chunky either? Then throw it in the fridge to cool.

YOU MUST LET IT COOL DOWN HERE! DO NOT BYPASS THIS STEP!

This is where you can cheat a little however. You can’t add the egg until the mash mix is room temperature and it is easiest to handle when super cold BUT once it’s just cooler than room temperature you can get on with the program if you’re like me and eating at stupid am.

While that’s cooling grab one of your eggs and whisk it lightly in a bowl, put your cornflour in a bowl and your breadcrumbs in a seperate bowl.

Anyway, once the mix is at least room temperature, if not completely cold, grab another one of your eggs and whisk it a little. Add that to your mash mix and mash it all together some more, but don’t over do it.

Final steps: Grab even chunks of your mash mix and shape them into balls. Coat the balls lightly in corn flour, then coat them in the egg and then – you guessed it – coat them in bread crumbs.

At this point you can put the uncooked balls into the fridge. Don’t try to freeze them because potato and freezing isn’t a great match but the tuna is cooked and they’ll keep a few days in an airtight container.

The ones you plan on cooking go in a frying pan thats either lightly oiled or had some butter melted in it. Butter tastes nice. Fry them at a medium heat until they’ve browned a little and heated through. Do not cook on a high heat because they don’t taste great burnt. Trust me.

That’s it really.

To serve… depends on the time of day and the heat. They require Mayonnaise not matter how they’re served, if you ask me. Patties and a simple salad is nice. Patties and a fancy salad could be nicer. As a kid it was patties and 2 minute chicken noodles with salad if Mum thought she could get us to eat it on any given day. And tonight, at 1am, it was patties with mayonnaise eaten with my fingers…

They’re kind of soft so it’s a tad messy but it was 1-fucking-am and that’s that.